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Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Adam Rubin reported that Terry Collins said in his state of the Mets presser that Justin Turner will be the back-up first baseman when Ike Davis needs off. Turner has never played the position at the majors and only one minor league game. If Turner makes the team as the back-up corner infielder the bench will be composed of entirely right handed hitters, aside from the possibility of Baxter or Loewen making the team as a 5th outfielder.

Last year, Turner in his first full season he hit .260 with a .334 BA, .356 Slg. and .690 OPS which included 4 HRs, 30 doubles and 51 RBIs over 487 PA. In three seasons in AAA he hit .307 with a .368 OBP, .440 Slg. and .808 OPS.

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong but Turner has options and I just don't see him as a fit for the major league roster at this time, I'd be planning to tuck him in Buffalo until I knew how Murphy looked at 2B.

First off I think the bench needs a second left handed hitter but if your forced to go with a righty shouldn't he possess more power then 4 home runs. Second I'm concerned with continually finding places to put guys on the field because they can hit, eventually were going to have an entire team playing out of position. How many runs will the offense have to make-up due to defensive gaffes from out of position players and how many can they, when they have a team of .356 Sluggers.

I don't mind the OBP small ball, get a base hit move the runner over to death type of offense but when your down by two or three with those runners on and it's late in a game with more then an out, your chances of that comeback are greatly reduced unless you have a thumper on the bench.

If Lutz or Satin aren't the answer then why didn't the Mets get a guy like Kouzmanoff who only signed for a minor league deal. I like Turner and he was clutch last year but calling him the back-up 1B especially with the make-up of this team makes very little sense to me...

And when Ike Davis is off, Justin Turner will man first base. Turner has not seen any major league action at first base, and has made only one appearance in the minors there -- with Billings in 2006. The bottom line, though, is that with Ronny Cedeno as a backup middle infielder, Turner needs the versatility to maximize his usefulness. And the Mets don't want to shuttle Lucas Duda or Murphy to first base occasionally since they're learning new positions. source ESPN NY

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